


Waiting for More

by peridium



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Bodyswap, Frottage, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Non-Penetrative Sex, Oral Sex, Season/Series 11, Sex Pollen, deancastropefest, ridiculous plot devices, they have way too much sex for one story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-03
Updated: 2016-09-03
Packaged: 2018-08-12 19:10:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7945861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peridium/pseuds/peridium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Anyway,” Dean says, spreading his empty hands, “we got hit by some kind of witchy simultaneous pon farr, did it like teenagers on prom night, and then swapped bodies. What else is new, Sammy?”</p><p>“Damn,” Sam says.</p><p>“Yeah,” Castiel says. “Damn is right.”</p><p>(Canon-compliant up through most of 11.18.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Waiting for More

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the inaugural Dean/Cas Tropefest! This was a lot of fun to write due to it being extremely silly. Basically I just took my two favorite tropes (body swap and sex pollen) out of a grab bag and tried to make something work. Since I'm me, I also tried to make it essentially canon-compliant up to a point.
> 
> Thanks as always to [Maja](http://archiveofourown.org/users/blindmadness) for being the most faithful and helpful of betas, and to [Bexy](http://archiveofourown.org/users/inplayruns) and [Julie](http://archiveofourown.org/users/xylodemon) for continuing to put up with me.
> 
> And _of course_ more thanks than I can properly articulate to [Maria](http://sketchydean.tumblr.com) for such ridiculously beautiful art, for being kind and communicative and fun to work with, and generally being a fantastic new friend. Seriously, isn't her art so great?! You should check it out/reblog it/marvel at its beauty over [here](http://sketchydean.tumblr.com/post/149886860871/for-the-deancastropefest-i-had-the-honor-of), too.
> 
> You're welcome to hit me up on Tumblr over at [sunbeamdean](http://sunbeamdean.tumblr.com) anytime!

Working under Crowley for too long is bound to make any demon go rogue, that’s all, and Lucifer always was an overbearing hack with a bark several times bigger than his bite.

And truth be told, Oriax _was_ a bit of a hopeless romantic in his human life. The will-they won’t-they saga of Castiel and Dean Winchester has been gossip fodder at the water coolers of Heaven and Hell for nearly a decade of earth time. That’s more than a thousand years down in the Pit. You get invested. Whether Castiel knows it or not, he has his admirers hidden amongst those fiery depths. So much open defiance of Heaven is bound to attract demonic esteem, after all.

Helping the Winchesters remove Lucifer is one thing. That’s complicated spellwork; he piggybacks on Rowena’s power for that, and he does his research. Spells of desire are another thing, however. Those are a dime a dozen. Back in the thirteenth century, he peddled those in European back alleys for pocket change. Oriax figures he’s doing these two a favor. He’s a demon, but he’s not heartless.

Dean and Castiel deserve one or two good nights before the Darkness unravels everything. They’re so wrapped up in each other already, they might not even notice the spell’s effects.

*

Castiel should feel good. He’s clear of Lucifer, assured of the Winchesters’ concern for him, and tucked into a freshly-made bed all his own, deep underground in the Men of Letters bunker. He doesn’t know how long he’s been sleeping, but it’s been hours since Sam and Dean tucked him in and told him to get a head start on recuperating.

He stretches. His fingers twitch, then curl in response to his own whims. He’s alone in his head.

Something deep-down and too-hot unfurls in the core of him. The muscles in his thighs tighten, and he groans as he pulls the covers tighter around his body. Sweat snakes down the back of his neck and all the small, fine hairs on his arms bristle as his consciousness tracks the movement.

It had taken so little effort to shake Lucifer off. Dean’s voice had cut across their connection like a knife through butter. _Castiel, show yourself._ And he did, and Dean’s expression in its naked hope had been enough. A breath, a moment to gather his reserves, and—Lucifer had fled in a rush of light and heat. Castiel hadn’t known he had such a display in him. He had thought that freeing himself would be much harder, had almost felt like a cheater in the immediate aftermath with Dean’s arms around him and Sam’s voice in his ear.

Maybe this feeling, then, is the delayed side effect. It’s only right there should be some consequence for letting Lucifer in.

He’s changed his mind about what he needs and has started shoving the covers off himself, stripping his shirt off and throwing it to the side with derision, when someone knocks at the door. _Dean,_ Castiel’s grace-heightened senses tell him.

His veins stir. His next breath feels significant. “Come in,” he calls.

“Hey.” Dean slides in and shuts the door behind him. He’s flushed, his cheeks pink and his eyes bright in the half-light of the lamp Sam’s donated to Castiel’s bedroom-in-progress. “Uh. You feelin’ okay? Still all yourself?”

Castiel swallows, too aware of the corresponding shift and bob of his own throat. “I’m, ah, not sure.” Dean’s attention has drifted to the nakedness of Castiel’s chest and shoulders. “I’ve been sick before, as a human. I’m not sure this is the same kind of fever.”

Dean’s drawn closer, and he hovers by the edge of the bed for only a moment before sitting, leaning toward Castiel. “You need—?”

“Yeah,” Castiel says without knowing what he’s agreeing to. He does need; he knows that much.

“Okay.” Dean’s tongue is pink as it wets his lips. “Um.”

The handful of inches between them are too many. Castiel drags himself closer, fisting a hand in the worn-soft cotton of Dean’s T-shirt. It’s the lone barrier between his palm and Dean’s skin, so it must be early in the day, before Dean has dressed himself.

“Okay,” Dean says again, quicker and quieter, and though his hand is poised to touch Castiel’s forehead the way worried mothers do on TV, he puts his palm to Castiel’s cheek instead, fingers curling around the shape of Castiel’s jaw.

Castiel’s blood is overwarm and all of him aches. “Dean,” he says. Heat’s gathering between his legs, an erection stirring to life in the loose flannel of his secondhand pajama pants. This is his body, all his and no one else’s once more, but he still can’t control it.

They stare a moment, or a full minute, longer, speechless like they’ve witnessed something awe-inspiring. Dean’s pupils are wide and dark and his mouth shines wetly in the lamplight and Castiel whines, a pathetic noise. He’s pleading, he thinks.

Dean’s tongue tastes like toothpaste and black coffee. It must be morning.

There must have been something that led to this kiss—some movement from Dean or himself, some tacit acknowledgement of its inevitability. The gap between their mouths must have closed somehow. It doesn’t matter. Castiel doesn’t care how they got here; he cares that Dean is holding his face in both hands and that Dean is licking the inside of his mouth and that Dean is close, his leg slung over Castiel’s lap and his thumbs stroking Castiel’s cheekbones.

“Yes,” Castiel slurs into the smooth curve of Dean’s lower lip. “This is—Dean—” _This is what I need,_ he thinks, and he would say it, but he’s occupied by the tilt of Dean’s head that slots their mouths together differently and pushes their kisses deeper and wider, messier.

He's pictured kissing Dean before. Of course he has, over and over, in vivid technicolor. He hadn’t known, though, to imagine the desperation of it, the slick noises, or the small details: the way Dean’s fingertips catch on the hairs at the back of his neck, the absurd thrill when he pulls Dean in and feels the press of Dean’s erection against his thigh.

“Holy fuck,” Dean says with a gasp. He’s panting, huffs of breath into Castiel’s ear.

“Mm.” Castiel reaches for him. He yanks Dean’s T-shirt up and shudders with relief when his hands touch bare skin.

“Cas!” Dean yelps. “Shit, man, I can’t—can’t think when you’re—when you’re doing that, oh, _Jesus_.” He moans, the best sound Castiel has ever heard, when Castiel rubs his knee against the front seam of Dean’s jeans. “Aren’t you supposed to be recovering? The hell _is_ this?”

“I am recovering,” Castiel says. The long slope of Dean’s spine feels good under his palm; he traces its outline once, then a second time. He allows a pause, an acknowledgment that something unnatural is afflicting him as he adds, “I don’t know what this is either. But I might like it.”

“God.” Dean leans his forehead against Castiel’s temple. Castiel can feel his mouth moving as he speaks. “I know—I know about wanting you. I mean, I know all the fuck about it. But this is…”

“I know.” Castiel kisses him, slow. Desire’s bubbling urgently all through his body and mind, but one careful moment can’t hurt too much. “I know the way I usually feel. How badly I usually want to touch you—which is very badly. But you’re right that this is different.”

“Very badly,” Dean repeats breathlessly. “Fuck. Cas. You gotta tell me to get the fuck out if you want me to stop. I know you’re in a pretty bad way.”

“I’ll be in a worse way if you don’t stop talking and touch me like you mean it.”

“Okay,” Dean says, “okay. Fuckin’—freaky sex plague. You’re so fucking hot, you know that?” He seems to realize he’s babbling, because he stops midway through a breath. “I want,” he starts, but the words must’ve stopped mattering, because he slides his hands up the bareness of Castiel’s stomach and chest instead. Whatever he finds there, he must like it. His eyelids flutter and his lips part.

Castiel takes hold of Dean’s wrist, guiding his hand down. “Me too,” he says around the rising moan when Dean gets the idea and works his hand below Castiel’s waistband instead, knuckles bumping the head of his cock. “Yeah,” Castiel hisses, his hips twitching up into the ghost of friction there, “that.”

Dean’s jaw is still slack, his eyes gleaming and his eyelashes like the golden rays around a small sun. He’s so physically beautiful that Castiel can hardly stand to reach for awareness of his soul, as well—it would be too much, he knows that much.

One last beat of the standstill, Dean’s hand poised with fingers curled just right to make fresh sweat trickle down Castiel’s back.

And then—and then Dean is on him, bearing Castiel down into the sheets with his knees framing Castiel’s hips and his mouth hot like a brand along the side of Castiel’s throat. He sheds his shirt in a frantic flurry of movement and when they kiss the next time, it’s a only a lovely backdrop to the dozens of square inches of skin-to-skin contact.

Castiel moans. He sucks on Dean’s lower lip and arches his back.

All the long stretches of Dean’s skin open to him, Castiel is greedy. He curls his hands around Dean’s biceps, the space on his left shoulder where the imprint of Castiel’s rescue has faded to near-nothingness. When Dean had come out of Hell with his tattered soul wrapped in the protection of Castiel’s grace, Castiel had remade him clean, smooth. In the years since, he’s rebuilt his collection of scars, and Castiel traces every one that his restless fingertips can find.

“I missed you,” Dean says into the dip where Castiel’s neck meets his shoulder. He presses his weight just right, and Castiel bites back a fresh moan as pleasure skitters through his nerves. His palm stills at the small of Dean’s back. “Okay? I fuckin’ missed you.”

“Thank you,” Castiel says. It’s all he can think to say. He missed Dean, too. He regretted that he would never get to say goodbye.

He pushes both hands down the back of Dean’s jeans, under his waistband, and draws the pad of his thumb along the lush cleft of Dean’s ass. It’s an experiment, and it pays off when Dean shudders from head to toe and muffles a low noise against Castiel’s clavicle. Castiel’s blood thrums, a fever-pitch in his veins and arteries and all the way down to his capillaries, and his patience is running out. Whatever has taken hold of them, it’s demanding its consummation.

It takes only a moment of frustrated fumbling to push Dean back so Castiel can pop the button of his jeans and wrestle the zipper down. Dean’s erection is hot in Castiel’s hand, starkly outlined in the cotton of his underwear, and it twitches a little in his grip, as eager as Castiel himself. Dean groans and bites at Castiel’s nipple; it’s a twinge of pain that twines around the haze of pleasure and heightens in, makes Castiel squeeze tight his handful of Dean’s arousal and revel in the answering whimper. 

“Dammit.” Dean, dropping open-mouthed kisses everywhere his mouth can reach. “I always said I was gonna—”

Any other time, Castiel would ask. He’d want to know what Dean has had planned. If Dean has thought about him the way he’s thought about Dean.

Now, he pushes Dean’s boxers down ungracefully. Bare, Dean’s erection is soft-skinned but hard in Castiel’s hand, wet at the head. It’s exactly what he wanted, down to the hitch in Dean’s breath. “Oh,” Dean says, his voice wavering, “okay. Oh, god.”

“Mmhmm.”

Castiel drags him back up for a kiss. He plans to taste every moan as he firms his grip, draws his fingertips along the length of Dean’s cock, tests the weight of Dean’s balls in the palm of his hand. His own arousal’s a deep ache at the core of him, pleading for satisfaction, and even the messy friction of rubbing against Dean’s thigh isn’t exactly enough.

“Dean,” he says helplessly.

“Hey,” Dean says. He’s panting into the hollow of Castiel’s throat, but he goes on: “Hey, I got you. I’m gonna take care of you.”

Castiel’s hands shake. He wants to grip Dean tighter, but Dean has other ideas. He’s shifting back—not without kissing Castiel’s chin and then jaw as he moves—and he’s rearranging them until they’re on their sides, facing each other. Dean’s lost the rest of his clothing and Castiel hastens to follow, ungainly in his hurry to work the pajama pants off his legs and lose them over the side of the bed. The mess can wait until later; nothing outside the borders of this mattress, these sheets, or Dean’s lopsided smile is real.

“Like this,” Dean says. His easy confidence slows Castiel’s desperation for the moment Dean needs to lick two broad stripes across his own palm and slip his hand between them.

“ _Oh._ ”

Dean grins. He’s so close Castiel can see his pupils expanding and his stuttering intake of breath, how it reshapes his mouth on the subsequent exhale. “See,” he says, but the cockiness has melted away, his grin replaced with a faintly stunned expression at the first long stroke of his hand where they’re joined, pressed tight. “It’s—ah—good. Yeah?”

“Yeah. _Yeah._ ”

Dean thought of him, missed him. Dean peeled Lucifer from Castiel’s body and now he’s coaxing that body to the heights of frenetic pleasure as if it’s an easy task. It’s more than simple enjoyment. It’s a jolt, deep enough to rattle Castiel’s grace, with each twist of Dean’s wrist and the catch of friction as their erections slide together. Castiel grabs for Dean, sucking bruises into the skin of Dean’s throat as recompense for how unforgivably good Dean is making him feel.

It builds and builds, too fast. Dean gasps _fuck fuck fuck_ and buries his face in Castiel’s neck. The fever-itch in Castiel’s gut climbs. He knows his own body; he’s touched himself. He knows the way it crests, usually slow and steady until the precipice. This isn’t that.

This is Castiel’s spine bowing, his toes curling, as he comes into the overheated space between his belly and Dean’s. This is Dean saying his name, just _Castiel_ in slurred awe, and it’s Castiel feeling each small shudder and jerk of Dean’s cock against his with Dean’s answering orgasm.

The aftershocks linger. Castiel fits his hand to the sweat-damp nape of Dean’s neck and his fingertips tingle at the touch.

It’s deeper and more jarring than a tingle, actually. A buzzing noise roars, sudden, in Castiel’s ears, and the residual spark turns into uncomfortable pinpricks all along his arms, his legs, the length of his spine.

He squeezes his eyes shut, bumps his forehead against Dean’s as he curls closer, and then blinks his way into the awareness that he’s looking at a face that belongs to his own vessel.

“Uh,” it says. “What.”

Castiel stares at himself through eyes that must be Dean’s. “Oh, fuck,” he says.

 

Initially, they separate out of nothing more than blind panic.

The bathroom door locked behind him, Castiel grips the edge of the sink and struggles to breathe. The clothing he’d thrown on in his haste to escape is too large, suited to his usual vessel and not to—

To Dean. To Dean’s body. This form isn’t a vessel at all. It belongs to someone who didn’t consent to its sudden occupation.

He doesn’t know where his own body has gone. Dean may have taken it to his room, may still be fitting Jimmy Novak’s lips around words he would have fainted to hear himself say.

Castiel touches his fingers to his mouth. In the mirror, Dean’s thumb makes a small indent in the center of his lower lip. His pants—Sam’s, actually—threaten to slip off of Dean’s narrow hips and the scanty covering of his undershirt shows every bruise and bite mark Castiel had left in his frenzy.

The haze of need for sex has faded, at least. That’s—something, Castiel supposes. When he searches for his grace, it’s there but it slips from his reach, as if it’s still tethered to his vessel and the physical distance is a barrier. Of course, that doesn’t make any sense. His likeness is essentially random, his body a trick of fate. His grace should have traveled with him.

He clears his throat, feeling foolish. “The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plane,” he recites to his reflection. The rough timber of his voice is undeniably Dean’s, pulled a few notches lower by Castiel’s presence in his body.

The shower he takes doesn’t necessarily help, but it washes the sweat from Dean’s skin. Castiel’s skin. Sweat that gathered as they kissed and touched, in thrall to some external force that wouldn’t be denied.

Castiel scrubs until his belly and thighs are pink and nearly raw. He’s, of course, heard of spells and incantations with aphrodisiac effects so strong they chase away all reason and caution. And ways to uproot consciousness from one body and place it in another; magic can achieve almost anything. The two at once, though? Or one as a consequence of the other?

He turns up the cold water. It doesn’t clear his head. It certainly doesn’t scatter the memory of Dean’s soft expression and hungry movements. He doesn’t look in the mirror again, afraid of catching an echo that won’t leave him alone.

 

“Hey, uh—” Understandably, Sam trips over the greeting. He shakes his head as if to start from the beginning. “Hi, Cas.”

Dean is hunched over a bottle of beer at the kitchen table, though it’s not even close to noon. He’s using Castiel’s fingers to peel and pluck at the label, piling its remnants neatly at the edge of a placemat. “Hi,” he says gruffly.

Castiel stays poised in the doorway. He had stopped by Dean’s room, unsure if he hoped to find him there. The sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach upon opening the door to an empty room had clarified nothing about his own emotions, and so he had rifled through Dean’s closet and drawers as quickly as possible for something to clothe this body.

“Hello,” he says, just belated enough that he can detect his own awkwardness. He fiddles with the cuff of Dean’s sleeve. “Ah. I imagine Dean’s told you about our problem here.”

Sam snorts and laughs at the same time. He offers Castiel a beer with the cap popped loose, and Castiel can’t think of what to do other than take it and have a sip. “Yeah,” Sam says, “sort of. He’s sulking. I’ve got the gist of things—it’d be hard to miss—but _someone_ doesn’t wanna tell me the details.”

Dean bristles, none too subtly. He’s swaddled in a hooded sweatshirt, his gaze focused on the mostly-empty bottle a few inches from his nose. “You’d be sulking too,” he says. His cadence and Jimmy’s voice make a dizzyingly strange combination.

“Maybe.” Sam’s nursing coffee rather than alcohol. “You guys can work your stuff out however you want, but if you want me to help, you’re probably gonna have to come clean. Just saying.”

Dean groans. He finishes his beer.

There’s no use keeping the details from Sam, but Dean looks miserable. Castiel hesitates, then steps in close enough to touch Sam’s elbow in silent thanks for his concern. The two inches of height he’s gained put Sam’s face closer, so Castiel has a different angle on the flicker of a bemused smile. “I’d like to talk to Dean,” he says.

“Sure. Good luck.”

Castiel may need that luck. Moving is just slightly more difficult—he had been awkward when he settled into Jimmy Novak’s form for the first time, but his grace and Jimmy’s predisposition toward housing him had eased the way. Inhabiting Dean’s body alters his proportions so minutely that he’s taken aback each time he moves wrongly.

Still, he maneuvers himself onto one of the kitchen stools. He angles himself toward Dean.

Dean looks at him, baleful. There are dark circles under his eyes, but Castiel supposes those have always been there. He’s just not used to seeing them from the outside.

“Dean,” he tries.

“Jesus!” Dean says, the outburst straightening his spine. “That’s so fuckin’ weird. You know how you never really know what your own voice sounds like? You hear it different in your head or whatever? I don’t think we’re _supposed_ to know, ’cause knowing is really freaking me out.”

A portion of the tension drains from Castiel’s borrowed muscles. This is more like Dean. “This isn’t really how you sound,” he says. “I manipulate your vocal cords differently than you do.”

“Ugh,” Dean says petulantly. “I’m afraid to move too fast, dude. Kind of scared I’m gonna blow something up by accident.”

“So you do have my grace,” Castiel says. “I wondered.”

Dean wiggles his fingers in the air a handful of inches from Castiel’s face. “Think so. I’m not poking at it too much. Like I said, not in the mood for random explosions.”

For another too-long moment—Castiel is specializing in those of late—Castiel stares, entranced by the sight of his own hand moving without his input. He’s destroyed demons, served Slurpees, mended clothing, and wielded angelic weaponry with that hand. Now it’s responding to the firing of Dean’s neurons.

Thoughtless, he reaches to catch Dean’s hand in his own. In Dean’s, that is. The logistics are impossible, but Castiel likes the visual, and he likes that he has the power to thread Dean’s fingers into the spaces between his knuckles. He’s yearned to know how that would look, and for this second, it’s easy to find out.

“Okay,” Dean says. His eyes are startled-wide blue. “Look, I just. Didn’t wanna tell Sam without even talking to you. I’m not even sure what happened.”

“I’m not sure either.” With the admission, Castiel tightens his hold on Dean. “It’s been an amazingly disorienting twenty-four hours.”

“Yeah, shit.” Dean breathes out with such care that Castiel can track the movement of his chest. The strings of his hoodie are uneven. “First Lucifer, now me? You can’t catch a break, huh?” He taps the fingers of his free hand to his temple. “Sorry, man. I swear this wasn’t on purpose.”

“I would much rather have shared with you than with Lucifer,” Castiel says truthfully. “If you ask me, the greater injustice is that I’m using your body. You and it deserved to remain clean of possession.”

“Yeah, well.” Another breath. Castiel wonders if it feels different through the lungs of an empty vessel. “We didn’t. Not your fault, either.”

Their hands are still entangled. Castiel rubs his thumb over Dean’s. Is that ephemeral twitch of the mouth the way he’s looked every time he’s felt particularly moved by his feelings for Dean?

“I don’t need to separate you two or anything, right?” That’s Sam, eyebrows quirked in a question as he peers around the doorframe. He doesn’t pretend to look at anything but their joined hands. Castiel appreciates that.

“Nah,” Dean says. “We’re good. Anyway.”

Dean’s good at shrugging off his emotions, and he does it now. He squares his shoulders, draws away from Castiel, and summons a crooked smile.

“Anyway?” Castiel prompts.

“Anyway,” Dean says, spreading his empty hands, “we got hit by some kind of witchy simultaneous pon farr, did it like teenagers on prom night, and then swapped bodies. What else is new, Sammy?”

“Damn,” Sam says.

“Yeah,” Castiel says. “Damn is right.”

 

As Castiel turns the page, the cotton of Dean’s button-down brushes a tender spot where he sucked a bruise into Dean’s neck perhaps three hours ago. A distracting flutter persists below his breastbone.

There had been nothing to do but to continue their work.

“We can’t drop the Amara thing like a hot potato,” Dean had said. He’d eyed Castiel, a faint desperation to his tone. “I don’t—we don’t know if she’s gonna keep fixating on me no matter who I’m wearing or if she’s gonna go all soul-vamp on Cas instead. He’s, like, two seconds out of one primordial force of evil using him to play dress-up. We can’t throw him to the wolves again.”

“There are three of us,” Sam had pointed out. He glanced between Dean and Castiel a handful of times with concentration furrowing his brow. “It’s essentially good that you’re both still here and intact. We can probably swing working on the Darkness _and_ on getting you guys switched back.”

Dean hates witches and Sam fears them because he admires them, so Castiel has volunteered to pore over spell books in the dusty recesses of the bunker library. It’s dark here, and quiet, and there’s a semblance of peace in scanning the shelves for promising spines, in the musty smell that washes over him. Many of these haven’t been touched for decades and most haven’t been read for even longer than that.

It’s also very boring. Spells are all much the same. Castiel has a broad theoretical knowledge of them, though he lacks extensive experience with their vagaries. Substituting one herb for another can have a drastic impact upon application, but the preparation rarely varies.

A twinge of pain spreads from between his shoulder blades. He’s slouching. Dean slouches, and he must hurt this way too, though he never mentions it. The folding chair Castiel is using is hard, uncomfortable plastic, and he shifts.

He’s alone back here. Cautious, Castiel undoes the buttons of Dean’s shirt, one by one. He dressed hastily, so that’s the only layer, and then he’s touching bare skin. Warm, peppered with scars, and not his.

Castiel breathes slowly. He spreads his fingers out along the slight curve of Dean’s stomach. The low current of a shudder creeps along his limbs. This morning, there hadn’t been time to appreciate the subtler sensations of touch—there had been nothing but the ravenous need and the haste to satisfy it. Dean’s nearly the same size as him, but there are dozens of small differences to appreciate: the tapering of his waist, the softness of his belly, the freckles scattered across his chest and collarbones.

When the pad of his thumb draws across his nipple, he sucks in a lungful of recycled oxygen. It’s _good_ , a sharp shudder of pleasure that makes his blood want to thicken. If this is how it always feels to touch skin to skin in this body, no wonder Dean has historically sought out sex so regularly. No wonder Castiel doesn’t feel sated despite the intensity of what happened between them earlier.

“Cas, I— _oh_. Hi.”

Castiel freezes. “Um,” he says.

“Goin’ full Fabio, I see,” Dean says, a little weakly. He’s hanging onto the edge of a bookshelf, another beer in his other hand. A handful of hours have eased his way into occupying Castiel’s form, and he looks nearly comfortable.

Heat breaks out across Castiel’s cheeks. Dean always has been more prone to blushing. “I’m—Dean, I’m sorry.”

Dean takes two, then three steps closer. Close enough that he can see Castiel’s hands, how they’re splayed across skin that doesn’t belong to him. “Hey,” he says, “it’s okay. I know I’m a pretty hot commodity. Just be glad Sam didn’t decide to check on you instead.”

There’s nothing to do but button Dean’s shirt back up. Castiel’s hands are clumsy, and he can’t watch them move for fear that he’ll remember too vividly how they had felt when they touched him.

“Dude.” Dean takes a noisy swig of beer. “Don’t freak out.”

“I’m not—” Castiel closes his eyes. He’d rather not lie to Dean. “I’m only freaking out a little bit. I’m… embarrassed.”

“Didn’t know you had it in you.”

Castiel laughs. It’s a good sound; he’s always liked to hear Dean’s laugh. “I’ve discovered a whole range of inconvenient feelings over the past eight years,” he says. “Humiliation among them.”

“Being human kinda sucks, huh.”

“No,” Castiel says. “No, I don’t think so. There’s just—a lot of breadth to it. Shame is difficult and far-reaching. I felt it when I worked in Idaho almost as acutely as I felt it when I unleashed the leviathan.”

Dean looks away. “Yeah. Well.” He visibly regroups, setting his beer bottle on a nearby eye-level shelf. “You don’t gotta feel it for this. I was actually, uh. Gonna ask you somethin’.”

“Anything,” Castiel says, grateful for the deflection.

Dean’s gazing down at the floor and his own stocking feet. With his eyelids low and his mouth softened by uncertainty, he makes Castiel’s face into something lovely.

“Dean?”

“Yeah, okay. Is it okay if I jack off?”

In the ensuing silence, Castiel’s book creaks shut where it had been sitting open on the floor by his feet.

Dean’s embarrassment is obvious now, no matter how effortlessly he was reassuring Castiel a moment before. He fidgets, shifts his weight, and doesn’t make eye contact.

“Dean,” Castiel says, “you don’t have to ask my permission.”

“Cas, c’mon.” Dean sounds abruptly on the verge of anguish. “It’s your junk I’d be using. I mean, I won’t—I can close my eyes or whatever, I dunno. I mean. I won’t if it’s too weird. I’m just kinda… worked up after we—you know.”

“After we had sex,” Castiel says.

“Yeah. Yeah, okay, after we had sex. Jesus Christ, we had sex.”

“I know. I was there. I liked it,” Castiel adds. It’s true, and he doesn’t want to forget that little piece of reality.

Castiel watches as his own face pinkens. “Right, yeah, well.” Dean scrubs a hand across Castiel’s features. “Just. That didn’t—get it all out of my system. I guess.”

“I guess,” Castiel repeats.

“So, uh.” Dean starts to make an obscene gesture, then seems to think better of it and drops his hand back to his side. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Castiel says. “Don’t worry about it.”

 

Castiel doesn’t take his own advice.

They’ve eaten pizza for dinner, polished off another round of beers, and concluded that they may need to reluctantly consult with Rowena. It’s bedtime, according to the Winchesters—Sam is in the shower and Dean has vanished into his bedroom.

And Castiel is sitting cross-legged on his own bed, hands clasped, worrying.

Dean may be touching himself. He has permission, after all, and—apparently—the leftover sexual appetite for it. It’s not possessiveness that plagues Castiel, or a sense of violation. It’s curiosity.

He hasn’t had full control of his vessel, his _body_ , for weeks. The time between the cessation of the attack dog spell and his decision to say yes to Lucifer passed too quickly as he struggled to recover enough to stay useful. When he lived in Rexford, fear of discovery prevented him from anything but the most cursory care for himself. If he did masturbate, it was furtive and unfulfilling. Since then, he’s been ill, or he’s been dying, or there just hasn’t been time between crises. With his grace in hand, the urge fades, easily pushed aside.

The hands neatly folded in his lap belong to Dean. He wants, badly, to know how Dean would choose to use them—and how Dean is choosing to map out Castiel’s body with borrowed hands. Whether he really is closing his eyes or if he’s watching himself. If the physicality of it is different in Castiel’s form.

Impossibly restless, Castiel gets to his feet and crosses the few yards of hallway that separate their rooms. An ear to the door tells him nothing; the bunker was built sturdily and meant to be largely soundproof.

Castiel knocks twice, quietly.

Dean opens the door a matter of seconds later, too soon for Castiel to have interrupted anything. Looking slightly down rather than up disorients Castiel for a moment, and so he doesn’t speak.

“Hi,” Dean says, his eyebrows quirking upward. “Kinda forgot I’d be lookin’ into a funhouse mirror for a second there.”

Castiel clears his throat. “Hi,” he says. The T-shirt Dean’s wearing is a little too tight across the chest; noticing it may be narcissistic, but Castiel does anyway. It’s Dean in there, after all. “You’re not…”

“Dude.” Dean’s nose crinkles up as he laughs. “Were you trying to walk in on me beating the meat?”

“Maybe,” Castiel says.

“ _Dude_ ,” Dean says again, covering his face with a hand. “What? The hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know,” Castiel confesses. “It’s—I’m not revoking permission. I’m not sure you needed my permission in the first place. But it is my body, or the closest thing I have to a body of my own. I wanted to know how you were touching it, if you were.”

Some flicker of interest draws Dean’s brows together. He steps back, inviting Castiel into the room. It’s comfortably lived-in, decorated to Dean’s taste. “So,” Dean says once the door has swung shut, “you’re saying you wanna watch.”

“I’m saying—” Castiel considers his next move. “I’m saying I want to know how you wield my hands on my body.”

Dean licks his lips.

“And,” Castiel says, “I want to know how it feels for you. If it’s the same as the way I feel when I’m the one inhabiting that shape.”

“Damn,” Dean says, drawing the word out over two syllables.

Castiel clasps his hands behind his back. Their palms are callused, rougher than he’s accustomed to. “I’m trying to be honest with you.”

“There’s honest, and then there’s—” The huff of Dean’s exhale is demonstrative. His eyes widen, then; Castiel’s face must have done something expressive. “Hey, no, I’m—you know what, I’m not complaining.” He grins, determination sparking in the flash of teeth and gums. “I appreciate it.”

Dean on a mission is a sight to behold. With a series of deft movements, he walks backwards and pulls his shirt over his head and off at once. The suddenly bare skin is, or was, Castiel’s own, but there’s a frisson of excitement racing down his spine nonetheless. It’s Dean, Dean peeling off his layers for the sake of Castiel’s interest; Castiel can’t help the way his heart rate climbs in response.

The edge of the bed hits the back of Dean’s legs and he folds neatly, sitting while he slides his jeans off his hips and down to the floor. Those don’t quite fit, either—too tight in the hips. Castiel sees Dean sigh with relief as his legs are freed, the lean muscle that flanks his thighs flexing when he toes the discarded jeans across the room.

Dean gives him an abrupt smile. “I was gonna say take a picture, it’ll last longer,” he says, “but man, I’d be staring too. You’re hot.”

“Hot?” Castiel raises an eyebrow. Luckily, Dean’s face cooperates with the gesture.

“Dreamy, whatever. I’ve heard it all. You’re a popular guy.” Dean’s stopped with his hands loose and open at Castiel’s sides. “Kinda cool, getting to take the Leonardo DiCaprio of Heaven for a joyride.”

There’s no point pursuing it, so Castiel tucks away the knowledge instead. Not that he’s a supposed heartthrob, but that Dean agrees. That Dean would have wanted to watch Castiel undress. That, just as Castiel is captivated now, he would have been spellbound by those exact fingers slipping through the waistband of nondescript boxers and by this body, a form acquired half by chance, bared down to nakedness.

The expression on that face is unmistakably Dean. He’s caught Castiel’s gaze like a challenge and he won’t let the eye contact go as he walks fingertips down across his sternum, his stomach, the trail of dark hair that leads to the stirring beginnings of an erection.

“Okay,” Dean says, almost under his breath. Long fingers curl around himself, the thumb pressed under the head, and Castiel’s distantly aware of his own arousal answering to the soft noise as Dean’s lips part. “So you just—” His hand tightens, and through the gaps between his fingers, Castiel can see his cock filling out, fitting itself to Dean’s grip.

“I have masturbated before.”

“ _God_.” Something strikes Dean the right way, maybe a lucky instant of friction, because the word shifts into a sound nearer to a moan. Dean’s eyes lower, his concentration on the near-lazy rhythm of his wrist. “I used to wonder about that. Y’know, do angels get that urge.”

“Angels I can’t speak for. Myself? I’ve always been curious. And it felt good. Awkward at first, but good.”

Dean’s teeth dig into his lower lip. “Yeah? Yeah, good. Guess that was kind of a lie. I didn’t really wonder about angels, I wondered about you.”

Castiel needs to sit, his knees weak, and there’s nowhere but next to Dean, close enough to hear the whisper of skin on skin as Dean’s hand moves. Still slow, without urgency. “Me?” he asks, just to hear Dean speak again. “I haven’t had much opportunity.”

“Mmhmm.” Dean’s voice has dipped lower, a fair imitation of the way Castiel sounds when he’s in that vessel. “Look,” he says—pointlessly, because Castiel couldn’t stop looking if he tried. “You really wanna treat yourself, you gotta take it slow.” He draws the pads of his fingers down his chest; a small shudder follows in their wake.

Electricity coils at the base of Castiel’s spine, between his legs, in the palms of his hands.

“Obviously touching your dick feels awesome.” Dean chuckles at himself. The movement of his hand speeds for a moment to show his meaning and his head tips back, revealing a fading bruise left tucked under his jaw by Dean himself that morning. “But, uh.” He stills, then casts a glance Castiel’s way. Those are not Dean’s features, but the calculated heat as he studies Castiel’s reaction is wholly recognizable: Dean Winchester on a hunt.

“Dean,” Castiel says.

“There’s just,” Dean says, “a whole lot of other stuff.” Assured that Castiel is watching, he pinches both nipples between thumbs and forefingers and moans. “Fuck,” he mutters. His erection sways as he presses into his own touch, into the path his fingernails trace down his sides, and Castiel’s cock hardens with every ragged breath he hears Dean take. It’s no effort at all, watching his own likeness squirm and pant, to imagine how Dean could have taken him apart, just like this.

In the hallway, the sound of Sam’s shower ceases. Dean bites his lip, but he doesn’t stop: he smiles in Castiel’s direction as he palms at the insides of his thighs, wrists brushing his cock and a noise like a muffled whine rising from his throat.

“’course, you gotta know—ah, fuck.” Dean stumbles over a hitch in his breath as he slides his fist down, back around his ready erection. Castiel wets his lips with his tongue, caught up in wishing himself back inside that body. “Gotta know when to stop teasin’ and let loose. You’re gonna know when you’re ready. It’s ninety percent mental or something.”

“And then?” Castiel speaks quietly, loath to break Dean’s focus.

Dean waits a moment. In the quiet, Castiel picks up on the sound of Sam’s door closing. A second passes, a confirmation that they’re alone, and then Dean’s sprawling back on the bed, propped up on one elbow. The ease with which he inhabits Castiel’s body turns it into an artful collection of sweeping lines and gentle curves; his hips roll up, into his waiting hand, and his mouth opens on a sigh.

“Then—” Dean’s answer dissolves into a rising moan and Castiel watches his knuckles whiten while the fingers of his free hand curl into the comforter beneath him. His cock nudges at the fly of his—Dean’s—jeans, so he cups a hand around the ache and swallows a whimper.

“Oh, shit.” Dean manages to laugh. He smiles at Castiel, his eyes dark, before he says, “You’re real sensitive, y’know that? This is gonna end up embarrassing me.”

Castiel leans closer. “I’m not sorry.”

“Fuck,” Dean says around a gasp. He’s stroking himself in quick, rough motions; sweat gathers along his clavicles and suprasternal notch, gleaming in lamplight. “Ah—geez, _Cas._ ”

“I’m here,” Castiel says.

“I know.” Dean’s voice comes close to breaking, and he sounds so much like himself, the shaky tenor of his voice so _Dean_ , that Castiel’s heart thumps absurdly in his chest. “Finally.”

Castiel doesn’t have time to speak before Dean comes, before his chin tips up and his throat is temptingly exposed and Castiel’s witnessing the flutter of eyelashes that must be what _he_ looks like in the midst of pleasure. Breathless, Castiel sets his hand atop Dean’s amongst the tangle of sheets. The touch lets him feel the tremors as Dean comes down and hear the way Dean whines as he stills, the mess he’s made beginning to cool on his stomach and knuckles.

Dean draws in a slow breath. He’s lightly flushed, and Castiel wants to kiss him—wants to kiss his own mouth for the privilege of swallowing the last of Dean’s moans.

He doesn’t. But he squeezes Dean’s hand and he rubs his thumb along the inside of Dean’s wrist, glad for the evidence of his ongoing heartbeat. Castiel’s pulse is loud in his ears, the throb between his legs demanding his attention, something more than the pressure of his fingertips through thick denim.

“I’m not sure I learned anything,” he says, and he’s rewarded with Dean’s laughter.

“Wasn’t my best lesson.” Dean gives Castiel an appraising look, his tongue pink as it moistens his lips. “Looks like you got somethin’ out of it, though.” He drags his fingers through the come on his belly, gaze sharp on the unsubtle bulge in Castiel’s jeans. “Narcissist.”

“No,” Castiel says. “Hopelessly attracted to you no matter your shape.”

“Dude.” Strangely, Dean seems startled by the declaration. A muscle in his forearm twitches, though he doesn’t pull it away from Castiel’s loose grip.

“Although,” Castiel adds, “your shape is one of my favorites.” To punctuate the point, he grinds the heel of his palm into the ache of his erection; the spike of pleasure pulls a gasp out of his lungs and has him grasping clumsily for Dean’s hand.

Maybe it’s post-orgasmic permissiveness, but Dean shifts himself closer, letting Castiel’s fingers fit around his own. He swallows audibly. “Permission granted,” he says, “in case that’s what you’re waiting for.”

Castiel shivers with relief and thumbs open the button of his jeans, zipper parting in answer to how hard he’s grown watching Dean. Unlike Dean, he’s not putting on a show or demonstrating anything: all he has to do is buck his hips into his ready hand and hang onto Dean.

He’s closer than he had realized, and Dean’s proximity hurries things along. There are dark tufts of hair framing Dean’s face and his eyes are still the wrong color, but his hand is warm in Castiel’s and when he nudges Castiel’s knee with his own and says, low, _Come on, Cas,_ , there’s nothing left for it. There’s only the rush of heat from the tips of his ears down to his toes and then his cock pulsing in his palm, the distant sound of Dean’s voice saying his name again and then again.

“Whoa,” Dean says.

Castiel allows himself a moment to breathe. There’s sweat still trickling down his spine, collecting at the small of his back under his shirt. He traces the shapes of Dean’s knuckles with his thumb without opening his eyes. If he doesn’t look, he can imagine that the face he’ll see when he does will be freckled and fine-featured.

“Hey.”

“Hello, Dean,” Castiel says, and he summons the fortitude to look into his own eyes without feeling the clutches of disappointment.

The lopsided quirk to Dean’s mouth couldn’t belong to anyone else, at least. “Had no idea you were that worked up, man.”

Castiel laughs. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

Dean’s smile broadens and softens at once. He gives Castiel’s hand a squeeze and then lets him go. “That was, uh.” He pauses, apparently thinking better of what he was going to say. “I hope that was what you wanted, Cas.”

Castiel wishes he could say _yes, it was, well done_ and keep Dean’s smile intact. His awareness is shifting back into focus, reminding him that he’s sticky and disheveled and unclean in a body that’s not his. Again, he thinks about kissing Dean, but again, he doesn’t do it.

“Thank you,” he tells Dean.

He hopes that isn’t the way his own face has looked each time they’ve had to part ways.

 

“An impossibly old witch on my most-called contacts and a seraph in my body,” Dean says darkly around his last mouthful of buttered toast. “Dunno which is weirder.”

“Or,” Sam says, “like we got turned into a sitcom without anyone telling us.”

Rowena is clearly unimpressed as she regards all three of them over the gilded rim of her teacup. “Yes, do continue with the witty banter. You didn’t call me here under the pretense of an emergency or anything, after all.”

Castiel clears his throat and says the magic words: “We need your help.”

A smile unfurls across Rowena’s narrow features.

Waking up had been an exercise in disorientation, to say the least. Falling asleep isn’t new to Castiel, though he hasn’t needed to for some time. He doesn’t recall deciding to sleep, only the slow creep of exhaustion into the corners of his eyes, the heaviness of his limbs once he’d cleaned himself up and retreated to the Spartan safety of the room down the hall.

Sam came for him with a knock on the door and an offer of fresh-brewed coffee. Castiel had blinked into wakefulness with gritty eyelashes and a foul taste in his mouth, his proportions wrong and his grace too far away to sense. It had gotten late in the day as he tossed and turned.

Now, Rowena shifts her glance from Dean to Castiel and, slowly enough to make a point, back again. “You two have been up to a bit of mischief, I can see that much,” she says.

Castiel focuses on his, or Dean’s, bare feet. The edges of his toes are callused, the result of a lifetime encased in boots, and the nails are clipped as short as they can go.

“Mischief is one way of putting it,” he says when Dean doesn’t step up to fill the silence.

The approach Rowena takes to laughing never gives the impression of any mirth. “ _Bumping uglies_ , then? I’ve got centuries of possible alternatives stored up.” Her lips purse and her eyebrows arch upward. “Ah, but I didn’t imagine you’d need a spell to get to that point. What an embarrassment.”

“Hey,” Dean says tersely.

Rowena holds up her hands. “A girl hears some gossip every now and then. What is it you’re going to promise and fail to deliver in exchange for my assistance this time around, boys?”

Sam lets out an annoyed breath. He’s fiddling with one of the map markers on the war room table. “Can’t you just pay it forward on the fact that we got rid of the guy who killed you? You know, Satan?”

“That depends on what you’re asking.” Rowena tilts her head to one side. Her well-manicured nails are pristine against the delicate pattern of her teacup. She must have brought that with her, or pilfered it from deep within the Winchesters’ cabinets—Dean would be mortified to own such a thing.

Dean gathers himself up. He makes it impossible to mistake him for Castiel, looks aside—the way he sprawls and then the looseness of his limbs as he straightens. Even the irritated set to his mouth isn’t something Castiel could ever replicate without practice.

“You’re pretty okay at the—magic stuff, yeah?” Dean fixes Rowena with a challenging stare.

She rolls her eyes, but Castiel suspects she’s taking the bait. “Don’t insult me, Winchester.”

Dean’s mouth tilts into a smirk. Affecting casualness, he brushes toast crumbs off the table and onto the floor. “Well, I’ve got a millennia-old angel here who couldn’t figure out what kinda spell’s being worked on us. Sound up your alley?”

Rowena huffs as if insulted, which is how Castiel knows they’ve secured her aid. “Angels know close to nothing about magic,” she says. “They only _think_ they know everything.”

“You’re welcome to one-up me,” Castiel says mildly. “My knowledge is almost entirely theoretical.”

The curl of Rowena’s lip is more than adequate to convey how little she thinks of Castiel’s knowledge. “So, you’re under a spell. Or perhaps two spells woven together. Hmm.” She takes two steps closer to Castiel, setting her tea aside—it vanishes neatly into thin air—and reaches up to tap the tips of her fingers against the side of his face. The last time she was this close, Castiel had watched, helpless, as Lucifer leaned in and took advantage of Rowena’s admiration to kill her. _This isn’t then. This isn’t even that body._

Rowena hums, thoughtful. “This is messy,” she says. Her fingers flex where they’re touching Castiel’s cheek, and then she withdraws.

“Great,” Dean says flatly. “Sounds like our usual.”

“Define messy.” Sam looks on the verge of springing up from his chair. Amusement touches Rowena’s features and she takes a careful step backward, out of Castiel’s personal space.

“A less kind way of describing this spellwork would be _sloppy_ ,” she says. “I’d wager you’ve been enchanted by an amateur—or simply an idiot—with too much natural power at his fingertips.”

Dean groans and slumps. The motion mirrors the slow way Castiel’s heart seems to sink. He’s never gotten entirely used to the physicality of how human bodies translate strong emotion, but now his limbs feel heavy with the revelation.

“Okay,” Sam says. Castiel takes a private moment to be immensely grateful for Sam’s relative composure. “If it’s amateur, that means you can undo it easily. Right?”

Rowena hesitates, and her silence speaks for itself. “Spellwork,” she says, “isn’t dissimilar to the art of tying knots. A good spell is intricate and complex, but it comes apart with a deft tug here and there. A bad spell—well, sometimes it’s weak and easy to undo. Other times…” She presses her lips together.

“Fuck,” Dean says.

“Agreed,” Castiel answers.

Rowena rolls her eyes delicately. “Speaking of,” she says, the lilt in her voice curling around the segue, “have you tried that? If coitus is what made the switch, then might it be as easy as that?

Carefully, Dean and Castiel refrain from looking at one another.

Sam sighs noisily. “You guys can talk about it if you want.”

Dean clears his throat, also too loudly. “We, uh. Does it count if you just—um.”

The sensation of blushing takes Castiel by surprise. He ducks his head. “I don’t think last night counts, no,” he says.

Rowena only laughs, as if the statement is wholly ordinary. “Well.” She tosses her hair over her shoulder and, oddly, directs her slanted smile toward Sam. “Then I have an initial experiment for the two of you. Don’t tell me you’re too afraid.”

Trepidation prickles across Castiel’s skin. He finds it difficult to lift his head to glance at Dean, and that difficulty is strange in and of itself. 

“Okay,” Dean says, blessedly taking over. “So, what? We just keep boinking and bouncing back and forth? I mean—uh, not to speak for Cas.” He coughs; Castiel looks up in time to see an expression of profound embarrassment pass across his own features. “Speaking for myself, I dunno that two’s gonna be enough.”

Castiel smiles despite himself. He shuffles his feet and then levels his gaze directly at Dean. “What about four? Or six?”

Dean’s eyes widen. “Dude.”

Sam scrambles to his feet. He nearly knocks his half-empty cup of coffee over in the process. “I gotta—”

Dean growls an irritated noise, deeper than his usual thanks to his current form. “We’re not gonna fuck on the table right here. Slow your roll, Sammy.”

Apparently triumphant, Rowena laughs again. “I don’t care where you make the beast with two backs, but if it doesn’t work, I’ll be needing to see the place afterward.”

Castiel catches Dean’s attention as it flicks across the room in apparent desperation. He spreads his hands minutely: _What is there for it? Is this really so bad?_

Then, Dean stands. He doesn’t break eye contact with Castiel as he gestures with his chin toward the residential hallway: _Come with me?_

Castiel would follow Dean anywhere, of course.

 

Intention changes things. Without pretense, Castiel can walk a step behind Dean as they make their way down the hallway. When Dean leads them into the room Castiel has been using, he can crowd himself into Dean’s space and breathe in the black-coffee smell of Dean’s breath without pretending he feels anything but curiosity and fear and desire all at once.

Dean’s chin tips up. They don’t kiss, but they’re close enough that they could.

“We don’t have to,” Dean says. He sounds embarrassed again.

Castiel frowns. He’s distracted by Dean’s thigh brushing his own. “We said we were going to—actually, I’m not sure of the details, but I’m pretty sure we just agreed in front of witnesses to have sex for a second time. Arguably a third time.”

The working of Dean’s throat is audible as he swallows. “You think last night counts?”

“I think the definition of what constitutes _sex_ is nebulous and mercurial,” Castiel says. He’s trying to tread with care. “I know that I wanted you last night. I know that I wanted to touch you with greater intent than I did at the time.”

Dean’s eyes close. He’s so near that Castiel can make out each individual eyelash, details he’s never bothered to notice of the face he’s worn for nearly a decade. “Cas.” His voice is rough—did Jimmy sound like that? It must be Dean himself. “I’m just—I’m so sorry, buddy.”

Baffled but trying to stay careful, Castiel touches Dean’s shoulder. “What?”

“I thought I’d done so good,” Dean says. He looks right at Castiel, steady. “Rescued you, y’know? I wanted you out so bad—okay, truth is, I wanted you back. Here. With us. I didn’t think maybe there’d be a catch. You didn’t even get to have your own body back for a whole day. All ’cause I couldn’t control myself.”

“Oh, Dean.” Castiel wants to kiss him. “That wasn’t your loss of control. That was—something outside of us.”

“Maybe.” Dean must want to look elsewhere, but he doesn’t. “I dunno. Not like I’ve never—wanted that before.”

“Dean,” Castiel says again. “I know what wanting you feels like. I’m not all that experienced with human desire, but desiring _you_ , specifically? Trust me, I’m familiar. What happened yesterday morning was very different. I told you that at the time.”

As usual, Dean is stubborn. “That’s what you felt.”

“Which,” Castiel persists, “was, I’m convinced, under exactly the influence your own feelings were under. That was a two-person affair.”

“You really think fucking again is gonna reverse it? Like we turned it on and we’ve just gotta turn it back off?”

Castiel spreads his hands. “I don’t know. Idiots can do a lot of damage with messy magic; I don’t know if it’d be that simple. If Rowena is stalling—which she is—it’s something she hasn’t seen before.” He pauses.

“But?” Dean prompts.

“But it’s possible,” Castiel says. “Sexual energy is a powerful force for spellwork.”

Dean grimaces, an unsettling expression on his current features. “Geez, that makes it sound gross. We can just say we did it, y’know.”

Taken aback, Castiel says, “What?”

Dean shrugs, a strange little half-gesture made with one shoulder. “We just hang out for a while, then we head out and say we boned. I mean, I dunno, _Time Traveler’s Wife_ daydreams aside, who really wants to do it with themselves?”

It had taken Castiel some time—too much time, in fact—to understand the vagaries of meaning at play when Dean deflects like this. He’s still a novice. He hesitates and then cups Dean’s elbow in the palm of his hand. “I’d be having sex with _you_ ,” he says, “if you wanted.”

“There’s no way it’d feel as simple as that,” Dean says.

“No,” Castiel allows. “I’m attached to the way you usually look. You’re beautiful. But I know it’s you in there. The way you move and talk; I can’t feel your soul clearly now, but I can sense its presence. I know it too well to mistake it for anyone else’s.”

Dean takes both of Castiel’s hands, pulls him in without further warning, and kisses him.

The first physical impression jars Castiel. It’s not exactly like kissing Dean had been before: the shape of the mouth is different. The hands holding his are bigger than the ones whose nerves are wired to his brain rather than slightly smaller. The clean human taste sparks at the edge with something else, like fraying wires without the acridity, and Castiel wonders if Dean really is leaving his borrowed grace alone.

Then Dean slows and nearly stops. He’s starting to second-guess himself. Castiel growls some kind of encouragement and kisses him again. Harder, mouths open, head angled to slide his tongue around the shape of Dean’s and to drink in the sound Dean makes in answer.

“You want,” Dean starts, panting.

“ _Yes_ ,” Castiel says. “Yes. I want.”

Another sound, a whimper. Dean’s mouth opens under Castiel’s easily and readily, so recognizably Dean. It takes a step, then another, for him to guide Castiel, arranging him against the unadorned wall by the door. Their movements are clumsy and overeager between kisses.

“Can I, uh.” Dean stops, and Castiel frowns. He leans forward, seeking another kiss, but Dean doesn’t meet him halfway. “I wanna try something. Can you keep your eyes closed?”

Castiel shuts his eyes in answer.

“Thanks.” Dean presses a fleeting kiss to the corner of Castiel’s mouth. “Kinda narcissistic, but just—try and pretend I look like me. This is gonna be too weird otherwise.”

When Dean releases Castiel’s hands and drops neatly to his knees with a soft _thump_ upon impact with the carpet, Castiel realizes what Dean is planning. Surprise tightens his chest, but it passes quickly when Dean’s hands settle at his hips, when he feels the heat of Dean’s breath through the denim covering his thighs.

“Guess every dude wishes they could do this,” Dean mutters. “Mazel tov to me, huh?” He noses at the crease of Castiel’s thigh. Castiel’s blood thickens and heats under Dean’s attention; he wants to look.

He doesn’t. He’ll have to stretch his imagination’s legs and let himself believe that Dean’s lovely, capable hands are the ones unzipping his jeans and working them down over his thighs. That it’s Dean’s mouth, pink and shining, exhaling against the steady rise of Castiel’s erection. Dean’s eyelashes, their tips golden as corn, fluttering where they touch the skin of Castiel’s stomach, making him shudder.

“Dean,” Castiel says, his mouth dry.

“Mmhmm.” Dean’s voice is low, indistinguishably hoarse enough that Castiel can pretend it sounds right. “Hey, Cas.”

Castiel can’t say anything else, because Dean’s urging him forward into the warmth of his mouth and because it’s all Castiel can do to bite back a whine until it leaks out as something closer to a sob. He covers his mouth with one hand, hiccupping out another high noise when Dean laughs around his cock. “Oh,” he says wretchedly.

It could easily be Dean’s smile, its familiar slant, stretching around the weight of Castiel’s arousal. Dean hums again at the back of his throat and—

And Castiel loses track of the specificities of Dean’s movements. There’s slick heat and Dean’s hand working to meet the relentlessness of Dean’s mouth; there are long fingers bracing at Castiel’s thigh; there’s Dean attacking the problem of giving Castiel pleasure with single-minded ferocity. His throat is slack and open and Castiel groans into his own palm wondering at how Dean must look—how Dean _would_ look, if they were in their rightful forms.

It’s so, so good. Pleasure spirals fast up and around Castiel’s spine, in the core of him and at every single place where Dean is touching him. When Dean slips off, kisses a path down the side of Castiel’s cock, and then sinks back down around him again, Castiel can barely say _Dean, Dean_ before his orgasm has his head tipping back against the wall and his legs shaking.

He won’t look, but he can feel the contractions of Dean’s throat as Dean swallows. The small indents in his own skin where Dean’s fingertips are digging in, hanging on through Castiel’s tremors until they subside and they’re both still. Dean holds Castiel inside his mouth one moment longer, and then the immediacy of his breath on Castiel’s skin is gone.

“Cas,” Dean says. He tucks Castiel back into his boxers, doing up his jeans. “You still in there?”

Castiel stirs, or tries to. The muscles of his legs are tired and they still want to tremble. “Hi, Dean,” he says. “Can I open my eyes?”

A beat, then: “Yeah.”

Carefully, Castiel doesn’t feel surprise when he looks down at his own face. Dean’s lending his eyebrows a hopeful quirk and his mouth is red.

“I feel like the freakiest freak in the world,” Dean says sheepishly. He draws his fingertips across his mouth. “That’s not really how I—” He huffs out a half-laugh and gets to his feet.

“Dean,” Castiel says. The lingering fog in his consciousness is turning him slow, but he reaches for Dean. “That was exquisite.”

Dean chuckles. “Dude.”

“Let me—” But when Castiel brushes his knuckles across the shape of Dean’s erection through his jeans, Dean startles and steps backward.

“You really don’t have to.” 

“I won’t,” Castiel says, “if it’s not what you want.”

“It’s your dick, man.”

“Then it’s familiar territory,” Castiel points out. “I want to touch you, Dean. Whatever that means. If you’ll let me.”

Dean draws in a quick breath. He’s flushed faintly, high on his cheekbones. “Maybe it’s gotta be reciprocated,” he says, “for the spell. Two orgasms or somethin’.”

“Maybe.” Castiel tries not to smile.

“Cas,” Dean says, his voice dropping low. He uses Castiel’s voice so expressively.

Castiel slips two fingers through Dean’s belt loop and tugs until he can swallow Dean’s groan of relief directly out of his open mouth. Dean’s erection presses right to the inside of Castiel’s thigh, impossible to ignore, so hard Dean must be aching. The messy fervor of their kiss distracts Castiel for long seconds, but he’s determined: he slides his hand into the front of Dean’s boxers, below the waistband until the head of Dean’s cock, slick with precome, twitches against his palm and Dean moans again.

The familiarity of the blood-hot weight pressed to Castiel’s fingers lends him some comfort. He’s touched this body in the night. He kisses Dean’s lower lip and curls his fingers until Dean gasps and thrusts up into Castiel’s ready fist.

“Oh, fuck.” Dean’s eyes are shut this time, but Castiel doesn’t mind looking. Dean inhabits this body wholly, the furrow between his brow and the crescents of his eyelashes too beautiful to belong to anyone else. “Shit,” he breathes. “I’m gonna—I got way too—”

It feels like cheating, how quickly and how effortlessly Dean comes into Castiel’s hand.

“Fuck.” A ragged murmur, tucked into the stubbled skin of Castiel’s cheek. “Got real close sucking you off, apparently.”

Shivers prickle their way along Castiel’s nerves. Dean’s body responds easily to thought; the knowledge of another’s arousal is enough to spark its answering aftershocks. “Dean,” he says. A small tilt of his head is all it takes to fit their mouths back together, for Dean to sigh into the space between Castiel’s lips.

“Well,” Rowena says, in tandem with the creak of the door opening, “I see it’s too late to tell you not to bother.”

 

“If it makes you feel any better, the enthusiasm with which you two tackled that did lend me _some_ assistance. Sex magic leaks copiously, which I’ve always thought rather appropriate.” Rowena smiles toothily at Dean, then at Castiel.

Castiel hadn’t known his vessel capable of that kind of deep-red blush until he’d seen Dean’s reaction to Rowena’s untimely entrance. They had sprung apart as if their mutual attraction was a secret, Dean hastily yanking his jeans back into place and Castiel doing a bad job of wiping his hands clean on the flaky wallpaper behind his back.

The war room had appeared unchanged upon their return, but Rowena seems certain that she’s uncovered the source of their problem. Certain enough to interrupt the task she had, technically, assigned them herself.

“Yay,” Dean grits out. “The hell’s your point?”

Sam inclines his head in Rowena’s direction. A quicksilver-fast expression crosses his face, and it occurs to Castiel to wonder what, if anything, passed between these two while he and Dean were so thoroughly distracted with each other. “She knows a guy,” he says, “who knows another guy, et cetera.”

Rowena smiles again. It’s no less menacing the second time. “Here,” she says, passing Castiel a cell phone. “You’ve got a fan.”

Uncertain, he holds the phone to his ear. The screen displays _Unknown Number_. “Hello?”

He hears static and then a tinny exhale followed by a tumble of words from someone who might be male. “Castiel? I mean—you sound like the Winchester, but if what Mistress Rowena tells me is true—”

“Yes,” Castiel says slowly, “this is Castiel. And you are?”

“I’m so sorry,” the voice says without explaining anything at all. “I meant to help.”

“Okay,” Castiel says. He lifts a skeptical eyebrow toward Rowena in hopes of prompting an explanation. “That’s nice. What are you talking about?”

“Well.” The voice draws out the word until it’s much too long and has too many consonants.

“I’m putting you on speaker,” Castiel tells it.

“Oriax,” Rowena says. She seems highly amused by the exchange. Dean, meanwhile, is gripping the edge of his chair’s seat and staring at the phone. “A very minor demon. Very,” she adds.

A noise reminiscent of a whimper grates out of the speaker as Castiel presses the megaphone icon on the screen. “I just really, really hated Crowley,” Oriax says.

“Amen,” Sam and Dean say in unison.

“Agreed,” Castiel says.

“That’s the most intelligent thing he’s said thus far.” Rowena, smirking.

A muffled sigh emerges from Rowena’s phone. “I hated working for him. And then I hated working for Lucifer. I hated them both.”

Dean flicks a look toward Castiel, lips pursed and eyebrows raised, that clearly means _I’m starting to like this guy, Cas_.

“Go on,” Castiel prompts.

There’s another noisy sigh. “What am I supposed to say? I admire Castiel’s work. I’ve got a terrible soft spot for a good love story. If romance novels had existed when I was human, I suspect I wouldn’t have gotten into witchcraft in the first place.”

“Holy crap,” Dean says, “you’re the one who did this to me and Cas.”

“Well,” Oriax says. He pauses. “If you want to put it like that.”

“I definitely want to put it like that,” Castiel says flatly. “Explain yourself.”

Another overlong pause ensues. Rowena rolls her eyes, managing to turn the gesture elegant and vaguely threatening. “He’s an idiot,” she says, “who didn’t bother checking whether spellcraft had progressed in the, oh, eight-odd centuries since he’d practiced it.”

“Hey!” The line buzzes around the demon’s indignation. “Give me some credit. I got Lucifer out of you, Castiel.”

“Using _my_ power,” Rowena says.

Oriax huffs. “Someone had to do it. Lucifer’s no more fit to rule than Crowley.”

“Thank you,” Castiel says, sincere for those two words. “Saying yes to Lucifer was a mistake. Now explain the rest of what you’ve done.”

“Everyone wants to see you two get together. I figured a little push couldn’t hurt.”

“Dude,” Dean says. He scrubs at his face with his palm, embarrassed.

“You didn’t even think about double-checking your work?” Sam asks.

“I didn’t think I needed to!”

Castiel shares a glance with Sam, who mouths _hubris_.

“So,” Dean says, sitting up straighter, “you’re a creep who wanted me and Cas to get together. What’s with the wacky side effect?”

“As I said,” Rowena cuts in. “Idiot. One aims for a spell that will encourage the touching of two bodies; one goes overboard with clauses about _feeling another’s pleasure as your own_ and _so two shall become as one_ ; one writes a spell in which an irresistible compulsion for sex results in the transplanting of consciousness.” Her smile is sharp as she extends a hand, requesting her phone back from Castiel. “I thought making him explain himself to the starring characters in his little fantasy might begin to serve as punishment.”

“She’s scary,” Sam says in a stage whisper to Dean and Castiel. “I think she has everyone who ever worked for her son on lock.”

“Of course I do. Once I noticed that a demon had cast this particular bit of ill-done magic, all I had to do was phone Crowley and ask if anyone had defected lately.”

“I didn’t defect,” Oriax, still on speaker phone, protests. “I rebelled.”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” Castiel says. “Just fix this.”

Rowena taps the screen and lifts the phone to her ear. “Just give me a moment alone with him, boys.” She sweeps off toward the kitchen, her voice pitching lower as she says, “Now, you’re going to cooperate with me, you little maggot.”

“Wow,” Sam says.

“Holy hell,” Dean says.

Castiel sinks into the nearest chair. Happily, it’s next to Dean, and Castiel feels justified in reaching for Dean’s hand. Dean hesitates, looks quickly at Sam, and then takes it, lacing their fingers together.

“I can’t say I was expecting—well, that.” Castiel rubs his thumb across Dean’s knuckles. The sound of Rowena delivering commands in the distance is making him abruptly impatient to reclaim their rightful places. He wants to know how it feels to hold Dean’s hand, not his own hand under Dean’s control.

“Looks like it kind of worked,” Sam says. He gestures with his chin toward Dean and Castiel’s linked hands, the side of his mouth quirking into a small smile. “The part about pushing you guys, I mean.”

Dean groans, but his grip on Castiel tightens. “Coulda done without voyeuristic meddling demons, but okay.”

“I did thank him for exorcising Lucifer,” Castiel says, “but I should have thanked him for ensuring that I didn’t die without getting to kiss you. I began to regret that the moment I let Lucifer in.”

Predictably, Dean’s shoulders draw up closer to his ears. “Cas—”

Castiel squeezes Dean’s hand, not to be deterred. “And thank you,” he says to Sam, “for assisting Rowena while your brother and I were preoccupied.”

Sam’s smile turns flustered in a familiar way; Dean wears the same expression much of the time. “She’s still scary as hell,” he says, “but she’s damn good at what she does. I guess all she needed was to measure, uh—the energy of whatever you guys were doing and then trace it from there. It’s pretty next-level witchcraft.”

“Oh, Samuel,” Rowena says brightly, framed in the doorway, “that’s so kind. Thank you.”

Dean perks up, though he doesn’t let go of Castiel’s hand. “You gonna fix us now?”

“I think fixing any of you three is well beyond my powers.” She tucks her phone into one of her many mysteriously-located pockets and adds, “But I can undo the switch my newest underling inflicted upon you.”

The efficiency with which Rowena reverses the spell reminds Castiel of the Gordian knot. The quickest way out, apparently, was through. She has them stand, both their hands linked, as Sam looms interestedly in the background. There are candles, a handful of words first in Latin, then in Greek—and a jolt of energy crackles through the air between Dean and Castiel.

Castiel’s vision blinks out alongside a wave of dizziness, and then he’s looking at Dean, whose eyes are dazed and green.

Dean grins at him, flashing white teeth and slightly pointed canines, and Castiel’s knees feel abruptly weak with relief. He’s missed that smile.

“Hello, Dean,” he says. Quickly, he checks for his grace— _ah, there you are_ , he thinks, because it’s his and it knows him and it knows to reach for awareness of Dean’s soul without hesitation. And that’s there too, luminous and as beautiful as ever.

“Hey,” Dean says. His smile widens, somehow, and he glances down at their joined hands. “You’re looking kinda short all of a sudden.”

“I’m guessing it worked.” Sam waves a hand in the air between Dean and Castiel’s noses. “Hi, guys.”

“I would like it to be abundantly clear,” Rowena says, “that you are all officially indebted to me, and that I may choose to call in this debt at any time and on any issue of my choosing.” She dusts her hands together as if washing them clean of this particular matter.

Dean’s hands are warm and callused. “Fine,” Castiel says, observing how the crinkles around Dean’s eyes deepen as he smiles again. “Within reason.”

“Actual reason,” Sam adds. “And keep that demon on a short leash, okay?”

Castiel’s sure without looking that Rowena is rolling her eyes. “I always do. It’s a pity my son doesn’t take after me.”

In a whirl of dress and cape, she’s snapped her fingers and made a dramatic exit, complete with a puff of smoke that Castiel can smell.

“You guys okay?” Sam taps Dean on the shoulder, and Dean startles, shaking his head a little as if to clear it.

“Yeah. Uh. I think so. Cas?”

“I feel good,” Castiel says truthfully. Still, Sam seems concerned, so he releases Dean’s hands and steps back to do an inventory of himself.

Yes, he does feel good. He feels—relieved and settled. This body, ill-gotten and remade time and time again, belongs to him. He flexes his fingers, stretches his shoulders, and can’t bring himself to name this form a mere vessel anymore. Its familiarity is another thing he’s missed since trading likenesses with Dean.

“Cas.” Dean touches his elbow. “Back to earth?”

“Yeah. I’m… good.” He gives Dean a smile, and then Sam for good measure. “Thank you again, Sam.”

“Family,” Sam says.

 

Castiel takes a long shower while Dean and Sam talk and Dean, thrilled to have his hands back, starts cooking dinner. He could clean himself with a thought, but he wants the time alone with his own physicality.

He’s been in this form for nearly a decade. It’s longer than he’s spent in any other vessel; in Heaven’s heyday, humans were worn for brief purposes, their memories wiped summarily if they’d survived the experience. For most of that time, he’s been alone in here—just his grace lighting up the neurons and synapses, no human soul sharing the space with him like he’d been reluctantly sharing it with Lucifer.

He undresses piece by piece, letting Dean and Sam’s discarded old clothes pile up on the bathroom floor. It’s satisfying to do it this way, to watch his own skin come into the harsh yellow light of this room.

The water pressure here makes his nerves prickle and he looks down at himself, studying what he sees. Castiel’s body is broad, dark-haired, capable. He’s grateful for what Jimmy Novak sacrificed, humbled that he can call this shape his own.

Someone knocks on the stall door to the rhythm of _shave and a haircut, two bits_.

“Dean,” he calls.

“Yahtzee.” Dean’s face—and fresh relief, coupled with fondness, washes down Castiel’s spine alongside the suds of his shampoo—appears, the door cracking open. He’s keeping his gaze toward the ceiling, which is charmingly pointless. “Sammy grabbed a six-pack. Figured now’d be a good time you to experience shower beer.”

“Shower beer?” Castiel asks. He accepts the proffered bottle, though.

Dean slings a smile toward him, and Castiel’s chest tightens. “Just trust me,” he says as the door swings shut again.

Castiel does. Puzzled and curious, he steps under the spray and takes a sip of beer.

Dean is right, naturally. The humid heat of the shower, the sharp cold of the fizzy drink sliding down his throat, the unwinding of his muscles—the cocktail of sensation pulls Castiel’s awareness of himself into sharp focus. He shuts his eyes and stands there until the bottle is empty, its label wilting, and every part of him is clean and reclaimed as his own.

 

Dinner proves difficult. The food is, of course, good; Dean routinely undersells himself as a cook. Castiel can’t quite taste food the way humans are supposed to, but he tries, and it’s worth it for the way Dean ducks his head and preens under the praise.

The difficulty is in Castiel’s precious hold on self-control. It’s in Dean’s shoulders, their breadth and solidity as he hoists the pot of pasta. Dean’s laugh as he threatens to make Sam take a portion with no vegetables. Dean, at home and comfortable and obscenely attractive.

“You’re gonna be eating real well now that you’re back for real, man,” he tells Castiel, sprinkling cheese onto a bowl of spaghetti and presenting it. Castiel licks his lips and tries to concentrate. He can’t taste the meal the way a human would, but he can taste Dean’s exhilaration and attention to detail.

It’s too much a relief when, twenty minutes later, Sam looks at them, pulls a delicately amused face, and excuses himself with an after-dinner beer in hand. “If you’d seen Dean losing his mind worrying about you,” he says, “you’d have some shows to go catch up on in your room, too.”

“Hey,” Dean starts to yell after him, then stops. “Actually, I’m gonna let that one go. He earned a freebie.”

“Come here,” Castiel says, and Dean does.

“Hi,” he says, sounding breathless. “It’s way better like this, huh?”

Castiel doesn’t need to ask what _it_ is. He knows, and he agrees. He touches Dean’s elbows, shoulders, chest. It’s good in a fundamental way, nearly to the point of righteousness, that Dean’s soul should return to its rightful form. Dean is handsome and his soul is magnificent—two great tastes that taste great together, like they say on TV.

Dean’s mouth tastes like tomato sauce and salt as Castiel kisses it open. He curls his hand around the back of Dean’s neck, glad for the bristle of Dean’s short hair, for the way Dean’s legs bow and make just enough room for Castiel’s thigh to find a home between them.

“I kinda forgot,” Dean says, half-gasping, into the little hollow below Castiel’s ear, “how hot you are when you’re—y’know, _you_.”

“Mm?” Castiel strokes Dean’s hip with his thumb, working his hand up under the hem of Dean’s T-shirt.

Dean chuckles, his breath warm on Castiel’s throat. “Don’t get me wrong, dude, I think your face is—” He whistles lowly. “But it’s not really the same without your weird personality and your stupid voice. The whole package.”

“Weird _and_ stupid, huh?”

Castiel can feel Dean’s smile against his skin. “Oh yeah. Like I said, the whole package.”

They kiss, slowly. Castiel wants Dean, but it’s a familiar cousin to the way he’s wanted Dean for years. It doesn’t demand immediacy above satisfaction. So he kisses Dean until the taste of dinner is gone and all that’s left is Dean, human and unremarkable.

“The first time,” Castiel starts, his fingers spread across the soft rise of Dean’s belly, “before we switched. You said there were things you had wanted to do, when you thought about us. You didn’t finish then. Would you?”

There’s the tickle of eyelashes as Dean blinks. “Uh,” he says, “yeah. I mean.” He clears his throat. His hands are comfortingly heavy at Castiel’s hips. “The whole unabridged list is pretty freakin’ long, but that morning, I just meant—” He bumps his nose against Castiel’s. “I always wanted to take my time. Make it real good.”

“It _was_ good,” Castiel says, because fear and fever aside, it had been. “But I know what you mean.”

Dean kisses him again. It’s demonstrative: the drag and press of Dean’s lips is careful, and he steps back from Castiel so they’re touching only with their mouths. Castiel’s hands hover and then still as he accepts what Dean is showing him. The next kiss pushes deeper, Dean’s tongue in Castiel’s mouth, and Castiel tries to hold onto his frustration. It spins into an urgent kind of desire with time, with Dean’s mouth slanting into a smile when Castiel grits out a noise of impatience.

“See?”

Castiel presses his fingertips to Dean’s obvious erection. It’s outlined by the fly of his jeans. Dean inhales sharply, so Castiel smiles. “Yeah,” he says, “I see. Sit.”

The kitchen table is the right height. Castiel directs Dean there with fleeting touches. When he kneels, Dean says “Oh, dude,” and Castiel laughs up at him.

“Hold still.”

“Dude,” Dean repeats weakly. He hangs onto the edge of the table and widens his stance.

Castiel can smell Dean from here, his sweat and his arousal and his well-worn denim. He noses at the crease of Dean’s thigh and monitors the spike of Dean’s pulse. It takes two hands to work Dean’s jeans down, over his hips until the head of his cock escapes his boxers, its shape straining at the black cotton until that’s pushed down too.

Hands braced at the insides of Dean’s thighs, Castiel rushes into this headlong and takes nearly the whole of Dean into his mouth in one motion. Dean’s erection bumps the back of his throat and he would cough, but an application of grace soothes the sting—and so does the tremulous sound that arises from Dean’s throat. Castiel’s aware of the tastes of salt and human skin, of the stretch of his own jaw. Dean whines again, his hips twitching upward as if he can’t control himself. Castiel’s getting harder in answer.

The physicality is repetitive and almost soothing. Castiel hollows his cheeks and moves with the small, involuntary jerks of Dean’s body. The room’s quiet of anything but Dean’s quick, shallow breaths and the slick noise each time Castiel pulls off, his lips parted against the plump head of Dean’s cock.

With his peripheral vision, Castiel sees Dean’s fingers flex where they’re clutching the table. Dean wants to touch. Castiel’s erection aches at the edges of his awareness.

Castiel wants to appreciate all the dimensions of the way this feels in his own body. There’s the rolling pleasure when he cups a hand between his legs, the heel of his palm to the swell of his cock. The thorny twist of desire at the base of his spine when Dean moans and thrusts into his open mouth. As he fits his hand around what his mouth can’t reach, the hinge of his jaw aches, undemanding but still there. He’s glad for all of it.

He’s even gladder for Dean’s shudder as it works up the length of Dean’s body. Dean whimpers, a bitten-off little _fuck_ , and then: “Cas, hey—”

Castiel hums thoughtfully.

A second shiver chases the first back down to Dean’s toes. “C’mon, you don’t want me coming in your mouth.”

“Mm.” Castiel sits back. Tipping his chin up, he sees that Dean’s head is thrown back and his cheeks are flushed. Dean’s cock gleams in the buttery kitchen light, wet with precome and Castiel’s saliva. “I don’t want you coming in my mouth,” he agrees, “quite yet.”

Dean lets out a breath, a shaky rush. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

Castiel chuckles. “Partly. I’m not teasing you,” he says, “I’m just… taking my time, as you say.”

The phrase earns him a laugh of Dean’s own. “Fuck you.”

Castiel only wants to explore. He pets the silky, thin skin of Dean’s balls and smiles against Dean’s hip when Dean curses. He kisses Dean’s stomach, sucking at the skin as Dean squirms restlessly. By the next apocalyptic disaster that forces them apart—by the time the Darkness steals Dean away in the night, or Lucifer finds a way back to Earth, whatever may come for them—Castiel wants to have nothing left to regret. He wants to have put his hands on Dean’s body in every way he’s wanted since he held a ravaged, sun-bright soul tight in the coils of his grace.

“Cas,” Dean says. His voice is threadbare.

Castiel, dropping a kiss to the sparse freckles of Dean’s inner thigh, glances up. Dean’s knuckles have gone white, the muscles of his arms drawn tight.

“Cas,” Dean says again. He touches one hand to Castiel’s hair, smoothing sweat-damp strands back from his forehead. It doesn’t count as holding still, but Castiel doesn’t mind; he turns his cheek into Dean’s palm until the moment passes.

“Yeah.” He kisses Dean’s wrist at the pulse point, then guides Dean’s hand back to the edge of the table. “I got you,” he says.

Dean slides easily back into Castiel’s mouth. The stretched-tight skin of his erection is hot and soft on Castiel’s tongue and against Castiel’s palm. His hips stutter up, and Castiel makes some low noise—encouragement—and Dean’s cock jumps a little inside the space Castiel has made for him as he comes right down Castiel’s throat.

Eyes shut, concentrating, Castiel swallows. He’s as hard as he’s ever been in this body, distracted by the attention his erection wants so badly, but Dean groans when Castiel doesn’t pull off. And so he can’t stop, can’t even want to stop until Dean begins to soften.

Dean hauls him up and into a kiss with hands fisted in his shirt. Too many of Castiel’s nerves are firing signals at once, hot and overwhelmed, and he licks into Dean’s mouth with a pathetic little sound. There’s the friction of Dean’s half-bare thigh between his legs, Castiel grabbing for purchase with a hand around the nape of Dean’s neck and the other spread flat on the tabletop.

Maybe it’s the newness of wearing his own body again. More likely it’s the curl of Dean’s tongue at the back of Castiel’s teeth and the weight of Dean’s hand at the small of his back. Castiel’s orgasm comes fast and sudden; he bears down into the solidity of Dean’s leg against his crotch until he’s gasping, his kisses sloppy, landing on Dean’s chin, Dean’s cheek, the corner of Dean’s mouth.

“Man.” Dean rubs his thumb alongside Castiel’s spine. Castiel shivers. “This is so friggin’ unsanitary.”

Castiel smiles. Dean’s pants are shoved half down, his cock flaccid and drying in the stuffy air of the room where he just cooked dinner for his family. His bitten-red mouth pulls into a crooked grin, and Castiel loves him.

 

The second shower after their restoration, they step in together.

Castiel’s hands don’t want to leave Dean’s body. Happy and sated, Dean is radiantly irresistible to anyone who can see the light of his soul leaking out with every smile. He insists on washing Castiel’s hair, his thick fingers capable. The steam curls between their bodies until Dean pushes Castiel against the wall of the shower stall and kisses him so many times that Castiel voluntarily loses track.

It’s growing late, but Castiel doesn’t need to sleep, nor does he want to. He can’t remember what it’s like to feel sleepy. Dean’s eyes are bright, his hair a nest of damp spikes after their shared shower. He pulls Castiel into his bedroom without so much as a glance toward the door of the room Castiel has been using. It’s a tidy room, humming with Dean’s energy.

The door shuts, and Dean rounds on him.

“You’re gonna stay,” he says. His tone is hard, inarguable.

“Dean?”

Dean’s jaw clenches. He tightens the belt of his bathrobe, though the stretch of his throat is still visible as it leads to his chest. “Look.” He jabs at Castiel’s bare chest with his index finger, abruptly fierce. “There’s only one person I wanna see looking like this and hanging out in my bunker ever again. It ain’t Lucifer, and it sure as hell ain’t me.”

Too late, Castiel realizes that Dean is asking a question. “Yes,” he says.

“Say it,” Dean insists.

“I’m going to stay,” Castiel says. He clasps Dean’s shoulder—call it force of habit. “Dean, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” Dean licks his lips, then leans in to touch his forehead to Castiel’s. “Just be here. Be here and look like the guy I—look like _you_.”

“I wanted to help,” Castiel tries. It’s some of the truth.

“Yeah,” Dean says, “I know.” He huffs out a breath. “That’s what Sam said. I wouldn’t let him convince me, but I knew he was right. You fucking asshole.” A beat passes, and then the anger washes out of Dean’s expression. The hollow of his throat still shines with humid moisture from the shower. “I was regretting a whole lot of stuff too.”

Castiel doesn’t push. He cups Dean’s face in both hands and kisses him.

The Darkness, just this once, can wait until morning.

*

“I _told_ you so.”

Rowena ought to have killed this little wretch first off. It’s not off the table, but traditionally, she likes to go back on her decisions only in the spirit of a good, old-fashioned double-crossing. She cups a hand over the receiver and levels a withering glance at Oriax, whose gawky, teenaged vessel doesn’t seem to possess the skill of looking embarrassed. “Pardon my peanut gallery,” she says.

It seems that Sam is still laughing. “I can’t decide if I should tell Dean how stoked this guy is or not,” he says. “He’d be so grossed out.”

“Your decision is clear, then, hm?”

Sam’s next chuckle crackles across the staticky line. Rowena hears him turn a page. This one, she thinks, is the underappreciated Winchester. She’s going to teach him so much.


End file.
